What is Solar Power made from?

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Tuesday, October 9th, 2007 Subscribe To Our Feed

What Is Solar Power Made From?

Solar power is basically sunshine

The Sun puts out colossal energy every day, which is almost all totally wasted. The idea behind creating solar power is to halt that waste by harnessing the Sun’s energy and putting it to practical use. To accomplish this, various forms of solar collectors absorb energy from the sun. The collected sunshine or ‘Sun energy’ is then converted into usable man-made ‘solar power’.

How Do Solar Power Systems Work?

There are several different types of solar power systems.
Sunfav.com provides free information about each of the readily available systems.

The energy collection devices are usually called solar panels. Solar panels are an array of specially designed light sensitive cells which capture and make available the energy which the Sun releases. Because the cells operate by absorbing sunshine, to work best the solar panels should be facing towards the Sun and in direct sunlight.

The 3 main ways solar power systems work at present are by

1. heating air

2. heating water (or some other liquid)

3. converting sunlight into electricity and either

a) using that electricity to provide for immediate power needs.

b) storing the electricity (usually in a battery) for later use.

How Does Solar Power Get Made?

The Sun’s energy is converted into solar power in one of 2 ways.

The devices used are called solar thermal applications or photoelectric applications.

If a solar thermal application is in use, basically we are harnessing and using raw sunlight. Sunshine is warm. The same heat in which we bask swimsuit-clad is used by solar thermal applications to heat up either air or liquid (usually water). The heated-up fluid can be used in several ways, for example, in a central heating system, or stored in an insulated hot water tank ready to be used for baths and showers.

Solar thermal applications like solar heating panels are used all over the globe in many residential and a smaller number of commercial buildings. This type of solar panel catches sunlight and uses the energy from the Sun directly to provide heat.

Photovoltaic Cells

Photoelectric applications use the Sun’s energy indirectly by converting it into electricity. Low maintenance photovoltaic cells which are part of the device use silicon-type semiconductors to convert the Sun’s energy into electricity.

For example, a solar powered calculator uses a bank of tiny photovoltaic cells to generate enough electricity for the calculator to do its sums. The calculator goes on working year after year without ever needing a battery.

I remember that when I was first given a solar powered calculator it seemed like some form of arcane magic to me, and I was deeply reassured when one day my calculator wouldn’t light up. I turned to my husband in relief and said “It needs a battery now”. He laughed at my feminine ignorance, of course, and just turned the calculator’s screen this way and that until it caught the light. I’ve had my solar calculator for 22 years now, and there’s never been a day cloudy enough – even in rain-shrouded Scotland – that the wretched thing couldn’t tell me how I’d mis-managed my budget!

But on the other hand, time without number I’ve justified buying myself a new plant with the reflection that I’m saving the plant’s price by not buying calculator batteries…